Wednesday, September 7, 2011

DEVELOPING: Offer made to Texas A&M and 14th team being lined up

Well, to the surprise of nobody, the presidents of the SEC, meeting in semi-secretness, agreed late Tuesday night to extend an invitation for Texas A&M to join the conference.

A press conference is expected sometime during the day today (Wednesday) where A&M prez R. Bowden Loftin will say pithy words and use lots of descriptive adjectives to describe his warm, fuzzy feelings for now being a part of the SEC.

And....supposedly SEC commissioner Mike Slive has been given the go ahead to find team 14. And according to Saturday Down South, West Virginia and Missouri are the two teams he's been permitted to extend a dance card to.

The ever diligent Chip Brown at Orangebloods.com reports the invitation had a stipulation to it. The stipulation is that the agreement is good, as long as no Big 12 team or the conference decides to sue the SEC. Brown says the conference has agreed to this, the member schools. Well, that decision hasn't been made clear.

Anyway, be on the lookout for team 14 and expect that announcement sometime after the football regular season ends. We don't expect team 14, no matter who it is, to go through this while playing.

We do raise a furrowed eyebrow to the suggestion that it might be West Virginia for the simple reason...why? There is not enough T.V eyeballs for that to feasible in our humble opinion. Yes, they have a decent football tradition and yeah, the Big East isn't exactly known for its football prowess. But why them?

Look for Missouri to be the team. They have to protect themselves and if the projected defection of Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas and Texas Tech from what is left of the Big 12 happens, they are on an island by themselves, the SEC would be a nice rescue boat to jump aboard.

UPDATE:

Here a statement released by the from Dr. Bernie Machen, Chair, Southeastern Conference Presidents and Chancellors:

"After receiving unanimous written assurance from the Big 12 on September 2 that the Southeastern Conference was free to accept Texas A&M to join as a new member, the presidents and chancellors of the SEC met last night with the intention of accepting the application of Texas A&M to be the newest member of the SEC. We were notified yesterday afternoon that at least one Big 12 institution had withdrawn its previous consent and was considering legal action. The SEC has stated that to consider an institution for membership, there must be no contractual hindrances to its departure. The SEC voted unanimously to accept Texas A&M University as a member upon receiving acceptable reconfirmation that the Big 12 and its members have reaffirmed the letter dated September 2, 2011."